The warming of relations between China and many African governments since the early 2000s has provoked considerable academic interest, as has the accompanying rise in Chinese investments and commercial activity across the African continent. This documentary, directed by Marc and Nick Francis, focuses upon Chinese relations with Zambia and provides portraits of some of the individual actors in this new era of relations between the two countries. The film provides insight into the political processes that have brought about greater cooperation between China and Zambia and manages to convey some of the personal issues at stake for those hopeful Chinese entrepreneurs and managers who relocate to the continent. It falls short, however, of offering a nuanced picture of the impact of Chinese commercial activity upon Zambian society.

After a short introductory scene that identifies the 2006 FOCAC (Forum on China–Africa Cooperation) summit as a crucial event in the development and strengthening of relations between China and Africa, the film follows three narrative strands. These strands are interspersed and begin in 2009, three years after the 2006 summit. Liu Changming is a former office worker from China who earlier brought his family to Zambia in order to start a farming business. He is in the process of expanding his operation and employs Zambian laborers, apparently on a casual basis. He and his Chinese colleagues communicate instructions to the workers in basic English, frequently chastising them for working too slowly. He is proud of what he has achieved and appears to enjoy his status as a landowner, telling the camera, “I was an employee in China, while I am an employer in Zambia . . . , a totally different position.”

The second strand of the documentary follows Li Jianguo, a project manager for China-Henan International Corporation, who is coordinating the rebuilding of one of Zambia’s most important highways. While the corporation has won the contract from the Zambian government to rebuild the road, the onset of the global financial crisis puts the government’s ability to continue funding the project into doubt, and by the end of the film Li is seen downsizing his team, uncertain whether work will continue. Li’s personal commitment to the project is clear: “Roads,” he says, “are like a country’s arteries.” The considerable amount of footage devoted to the roadwork provides an important insight into the dynamics of the relations between Chinese managers and African laborers.

The third narrative strand focuses upon the political aspects of Zambia’s relationship with China. Felix Mutati MP, Minister for Trade, Commerce and Industry, is seen visiting a Chinese-operated copper extraction facility in order to review its progress. He is also shown visiting China in order to generate commercial interest in Zambian mining and hospitality. Later a Chinese delegation visits Zambia in order to sign important loan and grant agreements. While these scenes are engaging and give some hint of how the two countries perceive each other, I found the pomp and ceremony of official visits and trade meetings somewhat overrepresented in the film at the expense of a more detailed examination of how Chinese commerce and investment influence African society.

To this criticism, I would add the comment that throughout the film the experience of Chinese subjects is privileged. For example, Liu and Li are granted considerably more interiority than the Africans whom they employ. Only very infrequently does the viewer hear from the Africans whom we see working the fields and resurfacing the road. One such instance—when the roadworkers share their feelings about how their Chinese employers treat them—gives an angle on the workers that remains present, yet underdeveloped, throughout the film. More of such footage would have helped to develop the contrast between working cultures that the directors are obviously trying to convey. Occasional scenes demonstrate the workers’ expression of their own agency—in one scene, for example, several farmworkers talk in their own language about a Chinese supervisor as she stands in front of them. But more investigation into what is at stake here—perhaps through interviews—would have given a fuller sense of the ways in which authority and individual agency interact. Likewise, if the filmmakers had included interviews in which the Zambian workers expressed their desires and aspirations—something that the Chinese subjects are frequently permitted to do—the result might have been more nuanced and less one-sided.

For the most part, the film employs a “fly on the wall” style: members of the film crew do not appear in any shot and are not heard speaking, although it is probable that the questions posed to the subjects have simply been cut from the final edit. As a result, the subjects appear at ease in front of the camera, but are nevertheless reflective and forthcoming about their feelings. That there is no spoken narration, with only a small amount of on-screen text to provide basic context, means that no clear argument or message emerges. Nevertheless, the movement among the film’s three narrative strands affords juxtapositions that draw attention to some of the power imbalances at play, perhaps the most notable of these being the cut from metropolitan Xiamen with its vast skyscrapers to Lusaka City Market. While the film therefore refrains from playing the problematic game of identifying bad and good players in China’s involvement in Africa, it does distance the viewer sufficiently to encourage her or him to cultivate a critical attitude.

Thus while When China Met Africa might have benefited from giving more screen time to the African workers who are employed by Chinese businesses, the film is a robust and compelling introduction to some of the human issues at stake in China’s latest encounters with Africa. A shorter, sixty-minute version that is included on the DVD (but not reviewed here) might be particularly suitable for use in the classroom.